10:50 am - A culinary experimentH has had to work all weekend, so on Sunday I made him a chicken pie and a massive bowl of mashed potato to cheer him up. There was some mash left so this morning I made mashed potato bread in the bread maker. Which is a real thing by the way (for example). I used about half a pound of mash to somewhat over a pound of white flour, and quite a lot of sugar to pep the yeast up a bit. I've just had a slice and it's worked out well. It's very soft and spongy, rather fragile to cut and spread.

abrinsky has been unwell all weekend, so on Sunday I made him dhal and rice to cheer him up. We contemplated, at the time, the fact that dhal is his comfort food and palak paneer mine.Mashed potato is still on the list, mind you.

I've not made bread with mashed pots, but I do like to be able to add potato flour to my gluten-free bread for the best texture.

Elizabeth David's Bread Book says that potato bread doesn't need sugar to pep it up--bakers call mashed potatoes "fruit" and use them to accelerate the rise. I *never* have boiled potatoes going at the same time I'm making bread, but potato water instead of regular water is supposed to help too.

That makes sense. My recipe said add two teaspoons of sugar, but it certainly puffed up very fully. Also I used 4 big spoons of olive oil (it said use sunflower) and that imparted quite a pleasant flavour. Anyway, it all worked much better than I would have thought. I think I will try more vegetable breads.